The Continuous Bliss of Knitting

Just had to come and write a little update because randomly out-of-the-blue-like (my favourite kind because it just grows itself, whatever the inspiration is) I felt to add a Links I Love section called Creative Craft Joy, which as yet is simply about knitting! Right now I am being flooded with joyous ways to expand this at some point into a full knitting section of this blog, because I love it SO much, so for now I am loving all of it and letting it float for future development (and manifesting a gorgeous camera and a Mac to help it on it’s way… 😉 )…haha joy of peaceful unfolding…

So knitting has been a massive passion of mine for about 6 years now. My Grannie taught me to knit when I was 12 and then (since I had since forgotten said initial experience) again when I was 22, at which point my passion immediately emerged and has organically grown itself. This has mainly happened because something that seems integral to my knitting joy is knitting things for other people (as anyone who knows me at all well has probably noticed). I just get so inspired by wanting to knit things for people – it’s like experiencing their uniqueness immediately translates itself into garments they might like and I get so excited thinking about it – colours, patterns, fibres, styles – that I could easily fill my entire lifetime just on that.

Happily I clocked a while ago that it’s also lovely to make things for myself… 😉 I smile but actually knitting has taught me a great deal about my energetic blocks! This particular one centred around my realisation that, whilst I had knitted a great deal of presents for people, I had never actually finished anything for myself because other people kept taking priority… 😯 Massive moment of clarity, which I have now found a lovely balance in… 🙂

Similarly, it has taught me so much about my nature – I spent a long time beating myself up over my inability to conform to the oddly popular notion that ‘one should finish a project before one starts another’. I just couldn’t seem to do it and my one project would sit forlornly, staring at me as I berated myself for being unable to enjoy it. That’s because that notion is bollocks, frankly, for me. That’s the least joyful approach I could possibly take, because the way knitting joy works best for me is to start new projects whenever I like – as the enthusiasm and joy fuels the whole process so much – and then if/when I run out of initial enthusiasm, there’s always another project on the go I will feel to pick up and carry on with, and that will suit the energy I have for it at the time (i.e. mindless or complicated!).

I have gradually learned that things do actually get finished with total joy, and not only that, but enthusiasm for all projects comes in waves; AND if I follow this natural flow, I also have abundant extra energy for when a project comes up that does warrant a quick turnaround. This last is quite counterintuitive, and yet, when you think about it energetically, does make a whole lot of sense because you cultivate joyful intention towards all your knitting possibilities, and so can begin to widen your ability to apply them. This awareness came fully into focus when my lovely sister asked me to knit her two pairs of socks, and she didn’t give me a time for them to be done or anything – and I felt a bit nervous taking a ‘commission’ because I had never joyfully undertaken one since working through my blocks to actually getting requests finished (…pressure…pressure) (= not finishing. Ever.) – but I felt so much joy about it (including in the concept of turning them around quickly and sending them off to her in a delightfully wrapped parcel asap), that that is exactly what happened… 🙂

So this is a little testament both to my joy in knitting, and what it has taught me about myself in so many ways along this conscious path. Also, I don’t know how I would have gotten through this whole process of awakening without it, since I had so much time where all I could find energy for creatively (or at all!) was knitting, and so I found myself cocooning quietly, listening to talking books, and knit-knit-knitting away, wondering what the hell was going on, why I seemed to be singularly unable to conform to anything, and when in the crap it would all be over. It brought me a great deal of joy to be creating something – ANYTHING – and even when I didn’t even have the energy to knit, sometimes just looking for patterns or taking what wool I had gathered out to peruse just kept me in enough joy to keep going. It also helped me assuage the unbearable guilt of not conforming to any societal expectations of usefulness – as I’m sure so many of you will be familiar with – whilst I grew enough self-love to realise they weren’t actually Universal Law and didn’t suit me in any way whatsoever.

So do look in the Links section if you feel, for my links to the knitting people and resources I have most delighted in and love to bring to fellow knitting-joyer’s attention (and anyone else’s for that matter!). This subject is a sweet and delightful part of life, and it’s a pleasure to share it with you in every single way I can think of…and the rest…

Post navigation

2 thoughts on “The Continuous Bliss of Knitting”

What an adorable thing! I really admire your concentration and discipline to immerse yourself in knitting. I just can’t do it anymore. When I was 15 my mother taught how to cross stitch and I LOVED doing that. However, as life took on a frenetic pace, I was never able to do it again and enjoy it. But keep at it, my wonderful Sara! So much Joy in those moments!

Yay! Ooh cross-stitch – I ADORED that for about 3 weeks when I was about 12 and have always been drawn to it but the time has not yet arrived…

Thank you Ivy – I think it was the fact that knitting was the only physical creative thing that brought me joy that made it possible for me to stick at it so easily! I’m just not like that by nature – so impulsive and varied in my moment-to-moment focus…So it just kind of happened, and I’m so grateful because I’ve learned how to joyously build creative discipline, without really even thinking about it until recently! Which was the only way it was ever going to happen to me… 😉 Haha.

Your life is already a masterpiece ~ you are simply in the process of remembering that it is so… Consider the word masterpiece…a piece of mastery ~ you are already a master ~ you are simply remembering that this too is so ~ Your life serves your mastery, bringing you the pieces you need to … Continue reading Masterpiece